


Every single story

by miabicicletta



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst and Feels, Character Death, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Holiday Ficlet, Speculative post S4 fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-23
Updated: 2016-12-23
Packaged: 2018-09-11 11:24:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8977669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miabicicletta/pseuds/miabicicletta
Summary: “When I say enemy, Molly Hooper, what is the first word that comes to mind?”





	

**Author's Note:**

> A small holiday fic, friends. I for one am very grateful this trainwreck of a year is almost over, and with new madcap crime-fighting nonsense just around the corner. (Picture your fave "emotion: excited" gif here!) I present this somewhat ridiculous, overly fluffy one-shot, which also serves as bit of speculation (laced with a dash of angst) about my suspicions for what is to come at the end of S4. Unbetaed, all errors my own.
> 
> Title comes from a great Shins song "40 Mark Strasse", which has nothing to do with anything other than it contains a nice observation about the stories we tell and what they mean.

_And every single story_

_is a story about love._

_Both the overflowing cup_

_and the painful lack thereof._

\- The Shins, [ _40 Mark Strasse_ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIBvvtqy-GY)

 

* * *

  

By both Central London standards and his own, the Watson’s Ordinance Hill flat was not a particularly long journey from Baker Street. Taking the Outer Circle route along the northwest edge of Regent’s Park, on average Sherlock Holmes managed the 1.2 mile distance in 23 minutes (1-2 minute deviation allowing for traffic lights, tourists, festivals, etc.)

As the minaret of the London Central Mosque shone like a beacon across the cold, cloudy winter night, Sherlock glanced at his mobile: Their present route time was running at 36 minutes and counting, and they hadn’t even made it past the boating lake.

The fault lay entirely with Problem A and Problem B.

Ben sniffled, his arms tightening around Sherlock’s neck. “I’m running away.”

“Mm. Unlikely.”

“I _am_.”

“Why?”

“Because of _him!”_ Ben flung one blue-mittened hand down at Sherlock’s right side.  

“I hope you do run away, and I hope _you never come back_!” Alex shouted back, shuffling obstinately. 

God, Sherlock thought. What he wouldn’t give for a cigarette right now. Ten cigarettes. And a double murder.

“Enough,” he said to the pair of them. “I suggest silence, unless you’d prefer to discuss with each other how you plan to apologize to Rosamund.”

“I’m not,” Ben sulked. He exhaled the overly dramatic sigh of a well-practiced martyr. “I didn’t _do_ anything.”

“Your behavior damaged Rosy’s gifts, caused a scene, and ruined the cake Mary made special for her birthday. I sincerely hope that Gladstone enjoy eating it off the Watson’s floor; it was a pity no one else was able to.”

Ben exhaled the overly dramatic sigh of a well-practiced martyr. " _Knew_ we shouldn’t have listened to you...”

Alex stopped in his tracks for the twenty-third time, outraged. “You _said_ to let Polly out of her cage!”

Ben sneered, tone acidic: “I said it would be funny. I wasn’t stupid enough to do it!”

Sherlock drew a long breath. “It is _not_ funny to terrorize a parakeet, nor to tease a bloodhound. Animals are not to be abused for your own amusement, Benedict, Alexander.”

Ben scowled.

Alex resumed walking. “ _Told you_ ,” he said, his voice smug with a child’s meanness. Sherlock did not enjoy the familiarity.

“Shut it!” Ben said. “You always blame me!”

“It’s always _your_ idea. You think you’re ‘the cleverest!’” Alex mimed.  

“ _I AM_ ,” Ben hissed.

Alex screeched, all but stomping his foot at the assault on reason.

“Annnnd speaking privileges are now revoked,” Sherlock declared. 

They each fell silent, perhaps contemplating the nature of their friendship with Rosamund Watson, beginning, one hoped, to see that there were consequences to one’s actions—

Softly muttered, in his ear: “I wish I never _had_ a brother.”

Returned by a vicious: “ _I_ wish _I_ never had one, either.”

 _It’s never twins,_  Sherlock thought. _Delicious_ irony. Mycroft would have appreciated it.

Possibly.

Sherlock carried a recalcitrant Ben up the stairs of 221B while practically dragging Alex along. It was a testament to their weariness that neither of them bothered to snipe at each other as they shed trainers and coats. Pink-cheeked from the cold, they donned pyjamas in irritable silence, brushed teeth, and climbed into adjacent beds. Through the door, in the nursery, Sherlock could hear the slow creak of floorboards under the rocking of a chair, the tinkle of a musical mobile. 

“Story?” Ben sighed. 

“Story,” Sherlock repeated. He reached for the bookcase. 

“Tell the magic princess story,” Alex said, sleepy.

Ben held up his hands like claws, objecting. “No the dragon-slayer one," he demanded. 

Naturally.  

 

Long after story time had ended, Sherlock sat on the floor in the top-most room of 221 Baker Street, watching his sons in sleep. They breathed deep and even through their small, freckled noses, while his Mind Palace echoed with the long-dead voices of dragons and pirates and heroes.

 _We’re not like other children._  

Glassware clinked on formica in the kitchen. He rose.

A glance in the nursery returned the satisfactory sight of a sleeping infant girl. Descending the steps, he updated the Google doc on his phone titled _METRICS: JULIA,_  and was pleased by the trending patterns he found in her sleep schedule over recent weeks. Kudos, Jules, he thought, and tossed his phone to the settee. 

Lights blinked from the tree by the window. Memories of holidays past sprang to mind mind. His own childhood, those in this flat, elsewhere. A woman and a gift. Mistakes.   

“Bad party, was it?” At the kitchen table, Molly glanced up from her laptop. An old pair of glasses sat atop her nose. She wore a faded uni jumper and blue shorts, looking rumpled and unconcerned in the way she had years before, when they first met. Stirring. “Mary texted," Molly explained.

“It was...memorable.”   

"If I didn't suspect it might invite  _more dramz_ I'd suggest we have a do-over here next week. No pets, minimal wild things..." 

Sherlock stole a fortifying sip from her wine. "Hmm?" He leaned over her chair, examining the contents of her screen. _Lancet_ article. Not work. Nothing that couldn’t wait…

She smirked. "Thoughts?" 

"Always." 

He set the wine behind him, and lifted Molly by the waist onto the tabletop. She blinking in surprised. Stroking the bare skin of her thigh, he leaned in.

And kissed her.

 

. . .

 

He took her to bed with an uncommon ferocity. It was like the first days and weeks and months, all over again, Molly felt. When he was all but devoid of sexual history, and starved for sensation. 

Sherlock clung to her now as they moved. He wound his fingers into her hair at the base of her neck, holding her so there was no space, nothing between them at all. She lifted her legs higher. She scratched her blunt nails down his spinal column, wanting to feel everything, everything. The pressure building, drawn out, enticed by his storm of passion, and when it broke under his beautiful, clever fingertips, it was all Molly could do to gasp and press her to his neck to contain her cries as she came.

Sherlock was usually talkative after sex (“I’ve noticed significant clarification of thought processes following sexual stimulation, Molly.” A beat. “Though it could also be your presence.”) but he fell into a languid near-silence once they pulled apart, laying his head on the sheet across her chest.

The soft glow of fairy lights blinked in from the rest of the flat. He stroked her arm, shoulder, the faint scar along her collarbone. She closed her eyes, feeling the bite of cold metal against her throat.

They moved dizzily into the shower. Under the spray, Sherlock silently backed her against the tile. He kissed her mouth, her neck, the scar again, then started something that required _leaving_ mid-wash, and a surprisingly athletic performance from both of them. They did actually manage to wash, eventually.

Donning the red dressing gown, she towel-dried her hair while Sherlock set about making a fire, his mood still subdued. She hummed a carol, glancing over at him, wondering...

Sherlock held up a pair of Nikes Ben had been missing for several days.  

“Where did you—?”

“Fireplace.”

“Alexander," she scoffed, rolling her eyes. “ _You little punk_!" 

Sherlock sat back in his chair. Molly put her laptop away, attempting to restore a bit of order to 221B. She returned several books on macromolecular structure, photovoltaic energy cell patents, and a copy of  _Lonely Planet Finland_  to the bookshelf. She was about to take down a trashy sci-fi novel to peruse when Sherlock reached out and pulled down into his lap.

Molly crooked a brow. “Um, hi.”

“Hel _-lo_.” He tugged at her robe, kissing her collar, her neck, her—

Molly put a hand to his chest, eyeing him. “Hey. What’s going on?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m not complaining, mind. But you’ve been _very_ attentive tonight, Sherlock. What’s going on? Is there some intention behind this?”

He paused. “How do you mean?”

“I mean, if we keep at this, I deduce we’re going to end up in another delicate situation, boyo. Which I think you know. I have seen the “data” in your spreadsheets, Sherlock Holmes. They are more than a bit obsessive.”

“Purely a scientific—”

“Yes, I’m absolutely sure _Nature_ will be fascinated to hear about your children’s sleep habits and my menstrual cycle.”

He blithely sidestepped her question. “You would be averse to another child?”

Molly’s brow rose. She was taken aback by his directness. “I’m not sure, to be honest.” She glanced up at the ceiling.

“We’re not terrible at…” He waved his hand at the mess of laptops and trainers; and coats and books and toys and holiday detritus. “This.”

“Sherlock, did something _else_ happen at the Watsons?” she asked, suspicious.

“Nothing out of the ordinary. Just you know, the usual war.” His jaw ticked.

Molly continued to look at him, waiting.

“When I say _enemy,_ Molly Hooper, what is the first word that comes to mind?”

She frowned. “I dunno, nemesis. Or, villain, maybe. Jim Moriarty.”

He looked up at her. “Interesting. I think _brother_.”

His brow crinkled, his focus zoomed out to something very far and away. For a long moment, he said nothing at all, and she knew what ever plagued his mind and thoughts was something very serious indeed. She began to suspect what that was, exactly.

“I’ve no _intentions_ , Molly. But I do want it to be different for them,” Sherlock said. He blinked, coming out of the darkness, out of the past. “I don’t want them to be like we were.”

Molly nodded, listening. With her fingertips she drew slow circles on the back of his neck. Some of the tension went out of his shoulders.

“Always at odds, both rivals, and enablers. Enemies and confidants. I don’t want them to feel alone in the world, except for this one other person you both love and loathe equally.”  

 _Oh, Sherlock_. “They won’t be like that.”

He tipped his head back again the chair. “They fight _incessantly_.”

Molly smiled in sympathy. “That is what kids _do_.” She tugged the hair at the nape of his neck affectionately. “Look at Rosy and Peter. Ask Mike, or Greg.” She tipped her chin toward the stair. “Ask Mrs. Hudson!”

He glanced up, puzzled. “She has no children.”

“I rather think she considers you and John her kids. You both secretly love her clucking, and you bicker like you were born for it.”

Sherlock’s bottom lip stuck out in the exact way his four-year-old sons’ did. He looked the part, too. “We wouldn’t have to if he wasn’t _wrong_ so much…”

He drummed his fingers on the chair. “I feel it might have been different if there were...other factors. If it hadn’t been just us.”

“They’ll have Julie-bean,” Molly pointed out.  

“Yes, but, is it enough?”

She shook her head. “Sherlock, listen to me: No amount of hypothetical future siblings for our actual, real-live children is going to change the relationship you had with your brother. Or what he meant to you. What he will always mean.”

His expression flicked, betraying the emotions roiling below the surface just as it had six years before, on perhaps the most terrible day of her life, when she’d stood before headstone bearing the old and austere name of _Alexander Mycroft Benedict Holmes_ and knowing the part she’d played in his death. It had taken a long time to come to terms with that reality, and the choices that had all lead them there.

Of course, those choices also lead them _here._

“I know,” Sherlock sighed.

“They also have Rosy and Peter to torment, and adore, and drive them mad. The dynamic won’t be the same. It couldn’t possibly.”

Molly slid fingers along his submaxillary triangle, tipping his chin up. “They won’t be like you were. They’re twins, first of all. And _ours_ , at that. They’ll be messed up and so important to each other in ways we won’t ever—and probably shouldn’t—fully understand.” Below the cool silk of his dressing gown, his heart beat strong and true. “We named them for your brother and because of everything he did, but they are _not_ you and Mycroft.”

“Was he lonely, Molly?”

She ran her fingers through his hair, thinking. The logs crackled. Shifting light grew and fell. “Yes, I believe he was.”

He nodded. After a moment he said, “You haven’t seen Ella recently.”

She leaned her head against his temple, looking into the fire. It was true. For longer than she had realized. Molly gave a little shrug. “I may, again. I don’t know. We’ll see. There are times I think about it and still feel afraid, and so very guilty, and a mess of things I don’t think I’ll ever quite be able to describe. Your brother died for me, and that is such an unbearable gift at times. I wonder if that is something I can ever possibly live up to.”

“But I also have three sproglets, two godchildren, and the love of friends who are brave and true.” She touched his face. The band on her fourth distal finger caught the firelight, and shone. “And I have you, my mad, brilliant detective. And there is nothing in this world I would not bear for you.”

She poked his shoulder. “And for the record, _if_ we decide on it—and I’m _not_ agreeing yet, Sherlock!—I suppose that would include minding another zygote, for a bit.”

He glanced up, waggling his eyebrows. “Sexy science-y talk, Dr. Hooper.” All fretful contemplation was gone away (for the moment), replaced by grateful mirth. Sentiments, all. How much he’d grown.

Molly tapped her hand on his chest, leaning into the warmth of him. “I know what makes you tick.”

He kissed her wrist above the pulse point. “That,” he said, settling them further into his chair, “is most certainly true.”

**Author's Note:**

> I am, as ever, unable to shut up about babies. Fail. 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading! As always, comments, thoughts, favorite lines, feedback...basically all manner of constructive criticism are not only welcome, but openly encouraged :)


End file.
